Tunisian Combatant Group

The Tunisian Combatant Group (TCG) was a Salafi jihadist terrorist network in Tunisia which was active from 2000 to 2003. It was founded in 2000 by Tarek Maaroufi and Seifallah Ben Hassine, who aimed to establish an Islamic state governed by sharia law; it was an offshoot of the formerly banned Ennahda Movement. The TCG adopted its strategy in Khost, Afghanistan, and most of its members were trained in al-Qaeda camps. By 2004, the TCG was incapable of operating in Tunisia, so it shifted its base to the Tunisian diaspora in Western Europe. The arrest of its founders in 2001 and 2003 led to the group's demise, and it later evolved into Ansar al-Sharia in Tunisia.